Chapter Text
The Avengers’ non-denominational holiday party gave new meaning to the phrase ‘Stark extravagance’. In a matter of hours, the Tower was decked out in festive lights and garlands that shifted in colour to reveal different portraits of all the Avengers and their special well-wishes to the citizens of New York. Passersby on the street stopped to point and gape as Captain America fluidly threw his shield or the Black Widow performed a perfect salto above the Tower’s front entrance.
Inside the warm interior of the Tower, Darcy watched the live-feed Tony had set up with a small grin, clutching her festive cup of hot cocoa close to her chest. The hustle and bustle of the actual Christmas party was playing out around her; all of New York’s finest happily chatting and overindulging in eggnog. Even the enhanced types, who were usually exempt from getting drunk, were becoming rosy-cheeked thanks to Thor’s special Asgardian brew which he had flown in via the Bifrost.
By instinct, her eyes sought out Bruce in the crowd. She found him by the bar, talking to a couple she recognized as the leaders of the Fantastic Four. By the way he was uncharacteristically leaning against the bar she could tell that he’d already had his fill of the Asgardian mead. Mr. Fantastic also seemed all too aware of his intoxicated status, not bothering to hide the sneer of derision on his face. Darcy had thought Reed Richards was a pompous asshole the minute she met him so she felt somewhat vindicated at being proven correct.
After taking a fortifying sip of cocoa, because she needed a rush of endorphins to keep her from strangling at least one wayward genius this evening, she squared her shoulders and tried her best to glide imperiously over to them. There was no doubt in her mind that she didn’t look half as elegant as Sue Storm while she did it, but that was of little import when her goal was saving her soulmate from stuck-up pricks.
Bruce’s face lit up as he noticed her approach, giving her that kind of dopey smile that she’d come to associate with the elation of long science binges. Almost automatically, her expression began to match his, just glad to see him so at ease. She hadn’t expected to ever find a forty-something year old man adorable, but he definitely qualified. Hell, the Hulk came out pretty cute too if you managed to look past the scary green exterior to the loyal heart within. She’d never forget how the big guy had put her on his broad shoulder and given her a tour of Central Park, terrifying more than a few tourists but making her laugh all the while with his simple commentary on plants and wildlife. To everyone’s surprise, biology was an interest that was shared between her two soulmates.
As she finally sidled up to Bruce’s side, Reed Richards squinted at her like he’d already managed to forget who she was after just meeting her. In contrast, Sue had the good sense to hide her surprise behind a polite smile. Darcy gave the two of them a stiff nod in return, before leaning up to press a kiss against the underside of her soulmate’s jaw. The little shiver she got in return never ceased to delight her. The bond they shared may not have been the stuff of Hollywood dreams but it was slow and deliberate in all the ways Darcy hadn’t known she was longing for.
‘Bruce, I was looking for you,’ she said, lying between her teeth. ‘Jane has baked these incredible chocolate cookies and you absolutely need to have one before Thor devours them all.’ She grabbed his hand and started to pull him with her, but he dug in his heels and shook his head.
‘Chocolate can wait, science first,’ he said in a tone that brooked no argument, but left Darcy seriously wondering if he had his priorities straight.
‘O-kay?’ She allowed him to tug her back in place as her gaze flicked between him and Richards in confusion. From afar their conversation hadn’t seemed particularly riveting or animated like science discussions tended to become. Plus, why the hell did she need to hang around for Richards’ overly complicated quantum physics. At least, Bruce knew how to explain those things on a more attainable level.
Her soulmate was adamant that she stay, however, as he planted her firmly in front of him. ‘Come on, Reed, tell her what you explained to me.’
Richards sighed wearily, like he was being asked to explain multiplication to a toddler. ‘If you insist,’ he began, eyeing Darcy with ill-disguised scorn. ‘It hasn’t escaped my attention that Bruce has been contacting a lot of our less ,’ he paused, looking for an appropriate descriptor, ‘ distinguished colleagues, especially those with a field of study that touches upon soulmate phenomena.’ Grudgingly, Darcy had to admit that she’d probably want to hear him out, even if Richards was being an unbelievable snob about her academic field of choice.
He dismissed the invisible specters of those ‘less distinguished’ colleagues with a wave of his hand. ‘I simply remarked upon the fact that the theory of quantum mechanics doesn’t directly support the existence of soulmates or soulmarks, and that it likely never will. It is fine to claim that particles behave in unexpected ways when confronted by interference from many factors, but entirely another case has to be made for particles maintaining connections regardless of how they have been separated by space and time. Quantum love is nothing more than a fad, in my opinion. Time will tell if soulmarks are wishful thinking or not.’
Darcy cast a pitying glance over at Sue who was staring at the floor with an air of defeat. How horrible would it be to be cosmically tied to a man who denied the validness of your bond with his every breath? Darcy couldn’t even imagine how she could stand to be with Richards when she had two men - admittedly, quite awful, supervillainous men - pining after her. If their places would have been switched, Darcy would have jumped into the sea with Namor any day of the week. (But maybe that was just her proclivity towards men with hidden depths, see: Bruce Banner.)
Bruce seemed to like Richards’ little diatribe about as much as she did. His hand tightened around hers. If he hadn’t been quite so drunk, she’d be on high alert for a Hulk-out.
‘That’s not what you told me, Reed,’ he grumbled with just enough of a drunken pout in his voice that Darcy had to bite her lip to keep from cooing at him. ‘That was useless bullshit.’
Wow, Darcy thought wide-eyed as she mentally fanned herself. Her Bruce had sharp claws. Oddly hot ones, too.
Richards scowled. ‘This is in your best interest, Bruce. Don’t waste your potential on scientific quandaries that only serve to amuse the masses. You’re way above that nonsense.’
Nonsense? Fuck that! Reed Richards had just won himself a one-way ticket to the rank of unrepentant assholes. Darcy imagined there was a plume of smoke now steadily rising above her head as she glared right back at him. ‘Well, maybe you shouldn’t stick your nose in other people’s research if it’s not to your liking,’ she spat. ‘Bruce can spend time on whatever the fuck he wants and that’s almost certainly not going to be boring interdimensional physics.’
Richards turned red in the face. ‘Boring?’
‘Yes, boring. And that’s from a woman who enjoys quantum mechanics for the masses.’ Pulling hard on Bruce’s hand so he would have no choice but to follow her this time, she began to march over to the couch that was farthest removed from that killjoy.
‘I have never--’ She heard him muttering behind them, indignant, followed by Sue’s much calmer reply.
‘Reed, it’s alright.’
Shutting the two not-so-fantastic superheroes out, Darcy held her head high until they reached her desired destination. Once there she flopped inelegantly on the cushions and dragged Bruce down with her. He let out a soft 'oof', but she knew he didn't really mind the rough landing as he molded himself to the couch without further complaint.
She poked him in the side. 'Hey, can I ask you something?'
'I'm pretty sure we've established that you can ask me whatever you want,' he laughed.
Internally, she wondered how long it would take for him to regret that statement. 'Alright, then. What did Richards say about soulmates that was so goddamn interesting that you had to drag me into the conversation?'
Bruce shrugged. 'He had this very in-depth reasoning about soulmarks being the result of quantum entanglement going haywire. He did not like that some relationship therapists are also using that theory to bring together couples whose marks never manifested. They call it the quantum love theory.'
'That does sound like something a hack would make up,' Darcy said, considering if it was worth contacting a few of those therapists to get their viewpoint on the matter. 'Could you explain it to me?'
'Quantum entanglement? Of course.' Slinging an arm around her shoulders, Bruce pulled her closer, so that she was practically lying across his chest. ‘The theory of quantum entanglement is not that difficult as long as you keep in mind that time and space are relevant,’ he began, breath tickling the hairs at the crown of her head. ‘For example, we perceive time as being linear, but there is no concrete evidence that this is the case for every instance of time. Time might not exist at all. Does that make sense?’
Darcy hummed, visualizing a pair of scissors cutting through the timeline she’d had to memorize during history classes. ‘I think so.’
He pressed a quick kiss to her temple before he continued: ‘Good. Quantum entanglement happens when pairs or groups of particles share spatial proximity in a way that makes it impossible for them to be described independently of each other. They overlap in a sense.’
Darcy frowned. ‘If they’re like minuscule venn-diagrams, why did Richards make it sound like such a phenomenon was highly improbable?’
‘He was alluding to the large distance that sometimes exists between these pairs. Even if two entangled particles would be miles apart, their quantum state still has to be described as a whole, a system, instead of independent members.’
‘Like soulmates,’ Darcy mused, tracing a finger down Hulk’s mark. ‘Two halves of one whole. Or any other crazy configuration you can think of. That’s pretty awesome. I wonder if--’
A loud snore interrupted her train of thought.
Startled, Darcy shifted to look at Bruce’s face only to discover that he’d somehow managed to fall asleep while she was pondering the implications of quantum entanglement. To be honest, she thought he looked even more adorable, all conked-out with his curls in a state of disarray.
‘Oh, Bruce,’ she sighed, tucking a curl behind his ear so it wouldn’t tickle the bridge of his nose anymore. ‘You really should work on getting more sleep.’
‘Isn’t that the pot calling the kettle black?’ Steve dropped into the one-sided conversation with a weary smile, slumping down on the couch opposite them. ‘I’ve seen your work schedule and it’s borderline inhuman.’
Darcy eyed the exhausted slump of his shoulders and decided she wasn't going to add another argument to her evening, no matter how unfair she thought that comparison was. She was in charge of running an entire lab, Bruce only had his research (and occasionally Tony's harebrained experiments) to worry about. Additionally, she had her dissertation to work on. Of course she had to work longer hours than him, otherwise the lab might just crumble at her feet. But anyway, she wasn't going to take his bait.
After spending hours interviewing Steve on societal issues, Darcy had become proficient at reading his moods and determining if his anger was directed at the world around him or at himself. This definitely felt like the latter. 'What's on your mind, Stevio?' She asked faux-casually, sinking further into Bruce's embrace as he continued to snore softly in her ear, trying to present herself as non-threatening as possible.
The challenge left the soldier with a puff of air and he sagged back against the cushions, not completely relaxed but more open. She could see him struggle to find the right manner in which to put his worries into words. ‘You’re better off asking what isn’t on my mind, honestly.’ He motioned at the party that was petering out around them. ‘The team, Shield breathing down our necks, the rules of modern society I still don’t know about... ‘
‘Seems like your worrying about everything, really.’
Steve’s laugh was devoid of joy. ‘Sometimes it certainly feels that way.’
‘Want to talk about some of them?’ Experience had taught her she could not force him to talk - evidenced by the fact that she still had no information on his soulmark - but him bringing his issues up was a good first step. Maybe taking a few courses in psychology back in college hadn’t been such a bad idea after all. With a team as emotionally complicated as the Avengers, she was really reaping the benefits.
Steve at least seemed to appreciate her giving him a choice in topic. ‘Shield, I guess. But I don’t want you to get in trouble for criticizing the organisation that employs you.’ His gaze briefly flicked over to Bruce. ‘Not while you have found something good here.’
She couldn’t help but smile fondly at his concern for her. Even while he was having a difficult time, he tended to think about others first, which, granted, might not be the healthiest reflex for the mindset he was in.
Stretching out a leg to pat his knee with her foot in a strange show of comfort, she grinned at him. ‘Don’t break your head over it, I’m about one-hundred percent sure that if Shield ever decides to fire me over giving them lip, Tony will hire me on the spot. It’s not like I actually work directly for them since Jane’s more of a consultant than an actual employee. Bruce and me are golden.’
‘Good to hear,’ he patted her foot in return, then sighed. ‘Shield has increasingly been contacting me about participating in missions outside of the initiative and I’m starting to feel like I can’t keep holding out without coming across as ungrateful.’
‘Why would you feel ungrateful?’
‘Because they found me in the ice and gave me the opportunity to start this new life, reclaim my legacy, find this… family .’ He sounded so heartbroken when he uttered that last word that Darcy simply had to extract herself from Bruce’s embrace and cross the divide between them to hug him. He clutched her tightly as she ran a hand across his tense back.
‘Hey, you build this family yourself,’ she reminded him firmly. ‘You don’t owe Shield for something they had no hand in even if they gave you the initial push. They haven’t exactly helped you navigate modern society, that’s all been by your initiative.’
Steve sucked in a shuddering breath. ‘Thanks. I just feel like I’ve left my days as the army’s dancing monkey behind only to be dragged into a new kind of performance. I never wanted to become a slave to somebody else’s agenda, much less to a great unknown like Shield. That’s not what Captain America was supposed to be.’
‘You don’t trust Shield?’ Darcy asked, thinking of all the shadowy figures that hid behind their screens and thought nuking one of the busiest metropolitan centres of the world was a valid method for conflict resolution. That kind of cold-hearted reasoning made her sick, and Steve too by the look of it.
His frown was so severe she could feel the stiff knot between his brows press against her shoulder. ‘Would it be terribly unpatriotic of me to say that I don’t trust them to stand for the same values as I do? The agents I’ve grown to know personally, like Natasha, Clint and Coulson, they’re people with good intentions, but most days I hardly feel safe turning my back on Fury. I don’t know if the people behind him have ever had their feet on a battlefield, if they know how hard it is on all of us to put a mission before the lives it impacts.’
‘That’s a fair concern for anyone,’ she mumbled into his hair. She might not have been the one fighting the Destroyer in New Mexico, but she had done her best to keep the innocent bystanders out of the battlezone. As they’d looked to her for guidance, she’d felt the heavy weight of responsibility crash onto her shoulders. Steve had to deal with that every time he stepped out of the door with a mission. ‘The seventy years you slept in the ice, the government spent those years proving all the reasons we should distrust them. Sometimes secrets are a necessity, but the level Shield is doing it at? They’re keeping people dumb for the sake of their precious national security, but honestly, who doesn't want to know how to react to an alien landing in their garden. I for one want to know if I should hold the welcome cookies or a baseball bat close at hand.’
Steve snorted at the image she painted. ‘Wouldn’t you get the taser out instead? Or call for Hulk?’
‘Shhh. Let me live this fantasy out.’ She tugged on his ear, causing him to pull away with a laugh. ‘But seriously, if you feel like you can’t continue to refuse, you could maybe throw them a bone and give those missions a trial run? Regardless, the Team will always be your family.’
His expression turned solemn as he pondered her proposal. ‘I could try, but I won’t be moving closer to Shield headquarters in DC. They’ll need to accept that the Team has my absolute priority.’
‘Precisely!’ Darcy beamed, winding up to bump her fist into his shoulder, but he caught it before the hit could land. With a secretive smile, he flipped her hand and immobilized it while he slowly spread her fingers open. Once her palm was exposed, he sat up straighter to grab something from his back pocket.
Confused, Darcy watched him fish out a folded white enveloppe. ‘What are you doing?’
‘Giving you an early Christmas gift as thanks for the pep talk,’ Steve explained with a wink as he placed the envelope in her hand and curled her fingers around it.
‘But I still have got a gift for you,’ she pouted. ‘Pep talks are a regular bonus.’
Steve paused, squeezing her fingers and wrist gently, and tilted his head to the side. ‘Believe me, you won’t want to wait for this one,’ he said, voice sobering. ‘Plus, my stomach’s all in knots and I can’t promise you’ll ever see this envelope again if you don’t accept it right now.’
Suddenly, the prospect of the gift became a lot more titillating. For him to be this nervous about something so simple, the content of that envelope had to be pretty significant. Possibly very personal…
A light bulb flashed to life at the back of Darcy’s mind, and her mouth dropped open in disbelief. ‘You’re showing me your soulmarks?’
Steve glanced around nervously to check if no one else was listening in, but any sober superheroes with enhanced hearing were safely out of range. ‘Couldn’t you say that any louder?’
‘Well, I didn’t exactly want to scream it from the rooftops,’ she answered, still breathless from surprise. Up until this point, she hadn’t actually realized that Steve trusted her enough to consider her part of his little family. She had to quickly blink away the wetness that was building in her eyes. ‘Thank you.’
Steve’s smile in reply was neither sad nor happy. ‘You’re very welcome.’ He released her hand and wrist, allowing her to unfold the envelope and shake out its contents.
Two sheafs of paper fell out. The largest one felt thick and textured under her fingertips and she immediately recognized it from the premium drawing pads that the soldier liked to tote around to sketch in during meetings. Anticipation filled her body as she carefully turned the paper over in her lap. It was indeed a charcoal sketch like she’d seen many from him before. Darcy marvelled at the delicate strokes with which he’d depicted the dip and curve of an ankle, too bony and breakable looking to belong to the Steve she was familiar with. Two identical lines of text curled around it, twisting together like vines. He must have drawn his old body from memory, she thought, so amazed at the attention to detail that she almost forgot to read the words.
Until the end of the line, Steve’s mark said in duplicate. One in clear cursive, another in letters that appeared vaguely cyrillic. Strange to have the same words for two separate soulmates, but not entirely unheard of. She wondered if he had already met both of them.
‘Those are beautiful words,’ she said, suppressing a cold shiver of emotion. ‘Were they the first?’
‘No,’ Steve replied, voice cracking. ‘They came right when I needed them most. When I was forced to give him up.’
‘Him?’
He tapped the back of the second sheet of paper on which, Darcy now noticed, had been written on in fountain pen. Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes at the first annual Stark Expo, New York, 1943.
Oh. Darcy remembered that name from her history books. It belonged to the only Howling Commando that hadn’t survived the war. She hadn’t known that they had been friends before fighting together.
‘He was my best friend, literally all I had before the serum,’ Steve whispered, seemingly reading her mind. ‘And I loved him, but I don’t think he was aware of just how much when he fell from that train.’ His eyes were pained as he flipped the photograph and revealed a handsome, dark-haired man in his mid-twenties, whose smile was just one shade away from devastating. He’d be hard to resist even without the soulmate bond. Darcy wondered why they’d never gotten together if they’d been so close. Surely, Bucky Barnes wouldn’t have minded the extra dimension of love existing between him and Steve?
‘Why did you never tell him he was your soulmate?’
‘I never saw his mark,’ Steve admitted as his gaze dropped to study the floor boards, trying to hide the doubt and shame that rolled off him in waves. ‘And the time we grew up in wasn’t exactly welcoming to same-sex soulmates or couples. Whatever we could have had, we would have needed to hide it under layers of deceit. I didn’t want that for either of us, so I just chose not to tell him.’
He might have loved you , Darcy thought silently. He loved you without knowing he was your soulmate. That has to count for something.
‘Maybe he never showed you because he was just as afraid,’ was what she chose to say instead, resting her hand against his broad shoulder, feeling the tense muscles shift beneath his skin. She knew her words couldn’t be much of a balm to a wound that had been festering for over seventy years, but she wanted to try to ease Steve’s mind a little. Darcy didn’t need to be genius to see that the death of his soulmate was weighing heavily on his shoulders.
A look of sorrow passed over his face as he stroked a thumb over the edges of the photograph. ‘Maybe.’
She placed a finger against his chin and turned his head to look him in the eye. ‘Promise me, you won’t let these past regrets drag you down. Bucky was an integral part of your life before the war, he wouldn’t want you to spend the rest of it dwelling on what ifs. He would want you to seize the day and find happiness and love, regardless if it’s romantic or platonic.’
Steve blinked slowly, eyes gleaming. ‘I will try.’
‘That’s my Captain.’ Darcy sniffed and drew him into another hug before either of them could start crying. Damn, now she didn’t think she could ask him about the other soulmate without completely ruining his evening. ‘I’ll use your gift wisely.’
‘I didn’t expect anything less.’
They stayed like that for a long while until they both felt more composed and ready to face the rest of the room again. Then, Sam called for Steve from the open bar, merrily waving the last bottle of Asgardian mead in the air and challenging him to come get it. Darcy bet he would have one hell of a hangover in the morning if the super soldier didn’t get there soon, so she sent Steve to the rescue with another reassurance that all information about his soulmark would remain between them. This was one thing she’d gladly take to her grave if he wanted her to. That got Steve to smile, at least, before he ran off to rip the bottle away from Sam’s lips and chugged it down himself. Boys.
Emotionally drained, Darcy wiped at her eyes to make sure no tears had managed to slip free and stumbled back to the couch where Bruce was starting to stir from his impromptu nap.
Still half-asleep, he squinted up at her. ‘Darce, where did you go?’
‘Nowhere special,’ she answered, tucking Steve’s envelope safely away in the pocket of her jeans. ‘I could hear your beautiful snore concert just fine.’
‘Sorry,’ he mumbled, racking a hand through his hair, causing the curls to stand on end. ‘I shouldn’t have fallen asleep like that.’
‘Eh, it’s probably a sign that we should go to bed,’ Darcy shrugged as she slithered into his lap, legs bracketing his waist. His hands flew to her sides, holding her securely in place. Just like he’d done the first time they met.
‘You’d have to stand up for us to do so,’ Bruce remarked dryly, stroking up and down her side. She hummed as the warmth from his palms soaked through the fabric into her skin right where her soulmark curled around her ribs.
Wait a second…
As wonder filled her thoughts, Darcy brought her hands up to cradle his face. ‘Did you say my third soulmark?’
Bruce’s eyes were like dark chocolate, pupils expanding as she leaned in. ‘Did I?’
Smirking, she stroked her thumbs along his cheekbones. ‘You’ll have to check once we actually manage to get over to the bed.’
As he blushed from the tips of his ears to the base of his neck, Darcy pressed her lips against his and sank into the sensation of having finally found all three of her terrifying and elusive soulmates in one neat, brilliant package. Back when she thought her soulmarks had ruined her life, she could have never imagined that she’d be able to love her soulmates like she now did Bruce Banner, with a warm rush of affection that had ample room left to grow for wherever the future would take them.
Just when their lips slotted together in a deeper kiss, Darcy felt like a piece inside of her did too.
It felt like acceptance.